BCSpace please respond - your loophole refuted

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_Sethbag
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BCSpace please respond - your loophole refuted

Post by _Sethbag »

This is the third or fourth thread where I've posted approximately the same refutation of BCSpace's main loophole verse, 2 Nephi 2:22. He's been ignoring these particular posts. I would like him to address this. He uses 2 Nephi 2:22 as a loophole to allow death and reproduction of living things before the time of Adam while LDS doctrine of Adam introducing death into the world is still true, claiming that said death and reproduction were occuring before "Creation" was finished, and that death and reproduction didn't disappear until Creation was finished, and that things thereafter (ie: after the completion of Creation) could not die, nor reproduce, until Adam Fell. Thus, he reasons, Adam introduced death into the (post-Creation) world.

Once again, here's BCSpace's loophole verse, and my refutation of it. First the reference from the relevant fiction:
22 And now, behold, if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden. And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end.


His reasoning goes like this: the "remaining forever as they were" bit only refers to things after they have been created, but if death and reproduction and whatnot were part of the creation process, then the verse doesn't explicitly discount that. I don't agree.

"All things" would have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created. Notice it does not speak of "The Creation", it speaks of the individual creation of individual things. It simply doesn't work to take these words and spin for oneself a coherent argument about how "The Creation" wasn't finished until hundreds of millions of years after things had been living and dying on Earth. The loophole scripture says that all things, not all species, not all kinds, not "the world" or any other abstraction, but in fact all things must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created.

The only way BCSpace can use this to support his loophole theory is if he proposes a meaning for the word "created" which allows for things to have come into existence, lived long and fruitfull lives, propagated their species, and died and gone back to dust, and yet never have been "created".

BCSpace, was a dinosaur part of the "all things which were created"? The dinosaurs were all dead by the time of Adam. So, were they ever created? Or did the "all things" not include the dinosaurs? We find their fossilized bones, but according to the personal definition of BCSpace of the word "created", they were never created? Dinosaurs lived and died before Adam fell, and dinosaurs certainly have their own claim to be part of "all things that were created". To plead otherwise is transparent word mangling.

According to BCSpace, "all things that were created" can have included none of the trillions of trillions of things which had been born (or subdivided, or whatever), lived, and died, for hundreds of millions of years, because homo sapiens, which had by Adam's time already been around for into the hundreds of thousands of years, were not "created" yet in the sense that they were not possessed by God-child-spirits.

BCSpace, your loophole doesn't work, and you should stop trying to claim it does and stop using it. "All things that were created" does not equal "The Creation" as an abstract process which you can say was not yet completed until the time of Adam. That verse was speaking of the individual coming into being "creation" of all things, and trying to argue that things that had been born, procreated, ate, crapped, and died of old age had never been "created" if they did so before the days of Adam, is just plain stupid.
Mormonism ceased being a compelling topic for me when I finally came to terms with its transformation from a personality cult into a combination of a real estate company, a SuperPac, and Westboro Baptist Church. - Kishkumen
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Post by _truth dancer »

So, just to be clear is BC saying that evolution was going on for four billions years or so then stopped about 6,000 years ago. At this time all creatures stopped dying and reproducing. Then the spirits of Adam and Eve were placed in their primate/Homo Sapien Sapien bodies, somewhere in Missouri and for a period of time (a year or two or twenty), life stood still (no death or reproduction) until Eve or Adam partook of the fruit?

Is this about it?

~dancer~
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Post by _Chap »

truth dancer wrote:So, just to be clear is BC saying that evolution was going on for four billions years or so then stopped about 6,000 years ago. At this time all creatures stopped dying and reproducing. Then the spirits of Adam and Eve were placed in their primate/Homo Sapien Sapien bodies, somewhere in Missouri and for a period of time (a year or two or twenty), life stood still (no death or reproduction) until Eve or Adam partook of the fruit?

Is this about it?

~dancer~


I think that is the nub of it. And when the Book of Mormon says "And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created", the reference to things being 'created' refers solely to their having been in existence at the moment when Adam and Eve received spirits c. 6000 BP. Nothing done before that time counts as something having been 'created'.

None of the following references can therefore be interpreted as a reference to things having been 'created' by God in the sense of the Book of Mormon as bcspace interprets it, since the parts of God's work described below took place before the 'creation', which bcspace has explained to us was the instant of the first human ensoulment:


GENESIS chapter 1

1: In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
2: And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3: And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4: And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5: And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6: And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7: And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
8: And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9: And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
10: And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.
11: And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
12: And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
13: And the evening and the morning were the third day.
14: And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
15: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
16: And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
17: And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
18: And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
19: And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
20: And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
21: And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
22: And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
23: And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
24: And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
25: And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.


As you can see from this version of Genesis 1 with direct links to a Hebrew lexicon

http://www.sacrednamebible.com/kjvstrongs/B01C001.htm

the word rendered 'create' here, bara, is the same when God 'creates' the heaven and the earth, the whales, sea-dwellers and birds, and (finally, in the following verses) human beings.

But how foolish it is of us who have not the spirit to try to understand the scriptures! We can never, never understand like those to whom God speaks directly! To us, in our blindness, it all seems so much nonsense.
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Post by _Sethbag »

Yes, TD, the nub, as Chap says it, of BCSpace's argument is that 2 Nephi 2:22's statement of things remaining as they were and having no end, is a situation that persisted only after they were created. He sees that as not in conflict with the idea of a "creative period" during which things were in fact living and dying. He then says that this creative period came to an end, Creation was complete, and then the paradisical state came into force and nothing died, reproduced, etc. from that time until Adam and Eve fell.

The only problem is that 2Nephi 2:22 does not speak of a "creative period". It references the state of "all things" after they were created. The obvious weakness of BCSpace's loophole is that it requires a definition of "created" that has all of the life forms that lived and died over hundreds of millions of years prior to Adam, including thousands of generations of homo sapiens, never to have been "created", because if they had been "created", then according to 2 Nephi 2:22 they must have remained in the same state they were in after they were created, until the time of Adam's Fall.

He apparently wants people to read 2 Nephi 2:22 as allowing for an abstract concept of a "creative period", but unfortunately the words of the verse don't allow for that. They specifically reference the state of all things after they were created, not just the state of a very small majority of all things that had ever come into being, which happened to still be around at the moment of Adam's ensoulment by a God-spirit-child.

I'm not sure we can expect BCSpace to have responded to this already since I just posted it last night, but hopefully he'll find some time to browse this thread and respond, and explain to us how his loophole still gets LDS doctrine out of its jam after all.
Mormonism ceased being a compelling topic for me when I finally came to terms with its transformation from a personality cult into a combination of a real estate company, a SuperPac, and Westboro Baptist Church. - Kishkumen
_bcspace
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Post by _bcspace »

This is the third or fourth thread where I've posted approximately the same refutation of BCSpace's main loophole verse, 2 Nephi 2:22. He's been ignoring these particular posts.


I haven't even seen such posts as your wont is to ramble on without providing any evidence or sidestepping the evidence. Such appears to be the case as well here today. Boring.

"All things" would have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created. Notice it does not speak of "The Creation", it speaks of the individual creation of individual things.


All things is the same as all individual things. Since you can't separate the two, your case dies right here.

According to BCSpace, "all things that were created" can have included none of the trillions of trillions of things which had been born (or subdivided, or whatever), lived, and died, for hundreds of millions of years, because homo sapiens, which had by Adam's time already been around for into the hundreds of thousands of years, were not "created" yet in the sense that they were not possessed by God-child-spirits.


All things mean all things to BCSpace. These are the end products (at the time) of evolution. Therefore, by your own logic, the other things which led up to all things are not under the "no death" condition and all you've done is prove my case.

Thank you!

So, just to be clear is BC saying that evolution was going on for four billions years or so then stopped about 6,000 years ago. At this time all creatures stopped dying and reproducing. Then the spirits of Adam and Eve were placed in their primate/Homo Sapien Sapien bodies, somewhere in Missouri and for a period of time (a year or two or twenty), life stood still (no death or reproduction) until Eve or Adam partook of the fruit?

Is this about it?


Close.

1) I don't believe we are limited to a Fall date of 6000 years ago. However, I believe my theory works for that or for one much earlier.

2) Considering that Adam was kicked out of the Garden, the question is did this state of no death exist only for that which was in the Garden or all the rest of the world as well? I believe my theory can handle either way if.....

3) Another question is how long in the garden? A few days? A few years? 100's or 1000's of years? I tend towards the shorter end of the spectrum. In that case, there is no noticeable delay in ongoing evolution.

None of the following references can therefore be interpreted as a reference to things having been 'created' by God in the sense of the Book of Mormon as bcspace interprets it, since the parts of God's work described below took place before the 'creation', which bcspace has explained to us was the instant of the first human ensoulment:


Two things to consider here.....

The plants and animals come before humans which is consistent with evolution. However, I wouldn't put many eggs into a basket that has Moses or any other ancient prophet perfectly understanding what they are seeing here without a scientific background. The same would apply to modern prophets as God's science far outstrips what we know today, though it wouldn't be as noticeable as that of the ancient prophets.

The other thing is that modern revelation clearly puts Genesis 1 and the first part of Genesis 2 into the spiritual creation, not the physical.

But how foolish it is of us who have not the spirit to try to understand the scriptures! We can never, never understand like those to whom God speaks directly! To us, in our blindness, it all seems so much nonsense.


Amen!
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Post by _bcspace »

The only problem is that 2Nephi 2:22 does not speak of a "creative period". It references the state of "all things" after they were created.


It mentions that these were created into a state of no death. That is the end result. What is the process of creation? Therein lies the creative state. The state of no death applies only to the finished creation and there is nothing you have said that precludes that. All you've done is deny it without showing how or why.
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Conservatism is the Gospel of Christ and the Plan of Salvation in Action.
The Degeneracy Of Progressivism.
_Sethbag
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Post by _Sethbag »

bcspace wrote:
"All things" would have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created. Notice it does not speak of "The Creation", it speaks of the individual creation of individual things.


All things is the same as all individual things. Since you can't separate the two, your case dies right here.

Huh? What are you trying to say? I'm not trying to separate "all things" from "all individual things" - on the contrary, I'm the one equating them, and using this as an argument for why a more abstract reading, such as "the Creation", or "the creative period", is not appropriate.

According to BCSpace, "all things that were created" can have included none of the trillions of trillions of things which had been born (or subdivided, or whatever), lived, and died, for hundreds of millions of years, because homo sapiens, which had by Adam's time already been around for into the hundreds of thousands of years, were not "created" yet in the sense that they were not possessed by God-child-spirits.


All things mean all things to BCSpace. These are the end products (at the time) of evolution. Therefore, by your own logic, the other things which led up to all things are not under the "no death" condition and all you've done is prove my case.

No. I'm sorry, BCSpace, but 2Nephi 2:22 doesn't say "all of the end products of evolution" remained in the same state they were in after they were created. It said "all things". All things includes the dinosaurs, the trilobites, the homo erectus, the other near-human precursor species, etc. All things means all things, BCSpace, not "all the things that came into being after just a few thousand years ago, and not including all the stuff there was for hundreds of millions of years before that.

I'd very much like to hear your argument on why "all things that were created" does not include, say, the dinosaurs.

Besides which, there is no such thing as an "end product of evolution". Evolution is an ongoing process, with no particular end state being worked toward.

The only problem is that 2Nephi 2:22 does not speak of a "creative period". It references the state of "all things" after they were created.

It mentions that these were created into a state of no death. That is the end result. What is the process of creation? Therein lies the creative state. The state of no death applies only to the finished creation and there is nothing you have said that precludes that. All you've done is deny it without showing how or why.

No. You're trying to turn 2Nephi 2:22 into a reference to "the Creation" again, when it's clearly not. It refers to "all things that were created", which was the individual creation of each individual thing. "All things that were created" has to include all of the things that break LDS doctrine, like the dinosaurs and every other living creature or plant that lived and died before the time of Adam. You cannot talk to me about "the creative state", because we have hard evidence of a great many things that are part of "all things that were created" that had lived and died for hundreds of millions of years before Adam.

You are totally relying on a meaning of "created" that would somehow narrow things down to only those things that were mythical "end products" of evolution, so that you can justify classifying everything up until Adam's body became ensouled as not yet "created", but still in the "creative state", and thus allowed to die, reproduce, etc. You are either word mangling "created" in this way, or else you are word mangling "all things" in order to find a meaning for that phrase which excludes 99.99% of all things that have ever living on the planet.

You are so wrong here. Your pet verse doesn't get you out of a single lick of trouble reconciling LDS doctrine of Adam being the first man, and bringing death into the world, with the scientific facts as we both know them to be.
Mormonism ceased being a compelling topic for me when I finally came to terms with its transformation from a personality cult into a combination of a real estate company, a SuperPac, and Westboro Baptist Church. - Kishkumen
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Post by _beastie »

According to bc's theory, dinosaurs (and all the other living things that went extinct prior to the advent of man) were never created.
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Post by _Chap »

beastie wrote:According to bc's theory, dinosaurs (and all the other living things that went extinct prior to the advent of man) were never created.


That seems to follow.

Isn't it clear that bcspace is not using the English word 'created' in the sense that a normal educated English speaker would use it in the context of a phrase such as "And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created"?

Since that is the case, all one has to do is to replace the word 'created' by a previously meaningless place marker, such as 'poopsnozzled', and state that 'poopsnozzled' is to be interpreted so that 'all things which were poopsnozzled' includes only those living entities present at the time of Adam and Eve's putative ensoulment, and excludes all the dinosaurs, etc.

The issue between bcspace and pretty well everybody else who has commented on this and related threads then reduces to a proposal by bcspace for a new "bcspace inspired (re)translation" of the Book of Mormon, in which the relevant verse of Nephi reads:

22 And now, behold, if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden. And all things which were poopsnozzled must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were poopsnozzled; and they must have remained forever, and had no end.


Frankly, given the apparent access of all LDS to divine inspiration whenever they feel they need some, and given that many of us think the Book of Mormon is fiction in any case, why should we object to bcspace adding a little creativity of his own?
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Post by _beastie »

All I can say is that you poopsnozzled a state of loud laughter in me, yeah, even that which included snorting. ;)
We hate to seem like we don’t trust every nut with a story, but there’s evidence we can point to, and dance while shouting taunting phrases.

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